


Endings and Beginnings

by Nicowafer



Category: Tintin - All Media Types
Genre: Drabble, M/M, what if
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-16
Updated: 2013-01-16
Packaged: 2017-11-25 16:33:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/640895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nicowafer/pseuds/Nicowafer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Tintin and Haddock had a fight? What if Tintin had left and Haddock didn't run after him? Years later Tintin reappears in his life, can Haddock forget the heartache?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Endings and Beginnings

“Are you going to have to die before you stop all this? Blue blistering barnacles! Does what I want mean nothing, then?” The captain shouted earnestly. His boiling point had been reached. Their recent encounter with a band of mercenaries with their eye on their friend the Emir's head, had been it. The captain was older now, older than he had been when he had first met the boy and he was settling into a life of leisure at Marlinspike. Tintin, for his part, was young, ambitious and unable to get his fill of adventure. There had been a time when Haddock believed he would never tire of this endless adventuring, when he believed he would follow Tintin to the ends of the earth and beyond. But this last time, things had gone wrong. People had died, Tintin had been shot and his heart had nearly been hit; the captain was now, more than ever, sure he only wanted to spend the rest of his days safe and sound at Marlinspike with the boy at his side. 

“Of course it does. But I can't help being who I am, Captain. I have to do what I think is right. If you don't come with me...well...that's always been your decision.” Tintin told him cooly. This indifference cut Haddock deeper than it should have. Inside his cool interior Tintin's heart screamed for him to take it back, to beg forgiveness and go and live with the captain forever and always, but the words had left his mouth and there was no turning back. His mind would not allow his life to be compromised all for the feelings he had for one man.

“Oh it has, has it? Not even when you know...when you know how I feel.” Haddock was sure Tintin must know why an old sea dog would follow the boy through hell. At first, coming to terms with these feelings had been shameful; Tintin was a young man, a boy really. But this was not the time for shame; this was a time for words and feelings, feelings that might mean something.

“Captain...” He knew that the captain was fond of him. That he always had been and Tintin carried a torch for the old man as well. But he would never voice it, it was not considered right or prudent. “I...know you are my dear friend...” his throat closed up, unable to voice the rest.

It had ended at that. The captain had stormed out, unable to voice it himself and unable to take it anymore. He hadn't even cursed; he hadn't made an attempt to say anything. There was nothing more to say.

******

Years were a funny thing when you got to be older, Haddock recalled. You could feel them passing like days and yet the days seemed long, like nights without stars. He stood at the window, watching the rain spatter against the glass, sighing, remembering things he felt were better off forgotten now. Life had been just one long day. The longest and most tiring the captain had ever encountered. Without Tintin it didn't seem there was much to it. He would walk in the country, he would eat his lunch, often he would yell at Calculus for yet another explosion that occurred on his property, but for the most part it felt empty. There was a longing that he couldn't quiet contain, a thirst he could not quench, and for all the wonderful people and things about him, one singularly important, bright spot was missing; the star that would lead him anywhere and everywhere. 

The thunder and lightning began and the captain turned away from the flashes and moved to sit in front of the roaring fire again. He wondered, as he often did, where Tintin might be. The old sailor had done his best to keep up with the journalist’s career, he never spoke to the young man, but he always read his articles, it was a way of being close without the boy being there. Last he had heard Tintin had been in the Arctic on some new expedition. This thought made the captain almost yearn for the adventure again. But he put those thoughts aside. Adventure was a young man's game, a young man like Tintin.

Lightning struck again and the lights flickered ominously, Haddock wondered if he should light some candles, fearing the lights would turn out and he would have to grasp in the dark for them later. Again the lights flickered and the captain made the decision to look for the candles. Passing through the entry hall he heard a sound not unlike the thunder pounding against his door.

“Ten thousand thundering typhoons, who would be out in this weather?” Still wary, though his days of foiling bandits and terrorists had ended when his relationship with Tintin came to its abrupt end, he picked up his cane from beside the door. Peering through the glass he could see nothing but darkness and rain on his front stoop; however the long lonely howl of a dog put the captain in a state of shock. It couldn't possibly be...The door was thrown open quick as the captain could manage it.

In the gloom of the night stood Tintin, older, his pants now full length trouser, lines beginning to make an appearance around his eyes from a life spent in hot deserts wincing at the sun. Haddock would have known him anywhere. The boy, the man, looked half-starved and tired but he was there all the same.

“Hello, captain.” He said as if he had never stopped saying it, as if it hadn't been nearly ten years since those words had left his throat. Haddock was in such a state that he wasn't sure what he should do and so he stood there, allowing the wind and rain to batter the entry hall floor. “I'm sorry to call so late, my boat just got in...Could I come in?” His voice was husky, as if he was afraid of the words. Haddock moved away from the door still wary, still unsure of what he was seeing, his grip kept tight on his cane. Tintin limped in, a crutch holding him partly up and there, right beside him, taking delicate little steps was a bedraggled little white dog, older, moving more tenderly, just as his master was, but still the same old Snowy. Haddock shut the door as the pair made their way in. Both left dripping trails of water, soaked from the rain.

“A billion blue blistering barnacles TINTIN! What in the name of the all mighty!” The captain was finally able to sputter out. Tintin turned towards him, dark circles marking his tiredness, but a smile still rose into the cheeks of the man Tintin, and the boy Tintin that Haddock had known all those years ago stood there, as if he had never left.

“Captain...” Tintin began sadly, but his tiredness won him over at last and he slumped on his crutch, nearly falling to the floor had the captain not tossed his cane aside and launched himself forward to grab the boy before he fell.

“Tintin! Wake up, Tintin...” Snowy let out a howl again. With no second thoughts, Haddock took the young man (crutch and all) to the room that had once been his own, removing the soaked clothes that Tintin must have been wearing for a month, no other thoughts crossing his mind except to get the boy into bed, warm and cozy and safe. Haddock placed the young man in the bed, tucking the sheets around his weary form. Snowy immediately took his place at his master's side. Tomorrow, Haddock thought, Tomorrow he would figure out why this phantom had appeared to him. For now he would let the boy sleep. For now he would allow his own mind to race, to keep him awake all night with questions he could not answer without the help of the man he still found he loved more than anything. His missing star had come home now he had only to disperse the clouds and he would once again have a direction.

The morning came bright and dewy, the sun shining into the window and onto the face of the sleeping Tintin, as if awakening an old friend finally come home. With a groan Tintin rolled over onto his side to glance out the window at the streaming sun. He couldn't recall, in all his adventures having seen anything so beautiful; the sun on the window pane, the ceiling of this room, all was beautiful to the eyes of the weary man.

He had left the captain as a young man and now returned older and perhaps, he hoped, a bit wiser; Snowy yapped and whined, hopping off the bed without his puppy like enthusiasm and made for the door.

“All right, Snowy, all right.” Tintin said, stretching and sitting up. One night in a comfortable bed, one night in Marlinspike Hall was enough to pull some of that bone tiredness out of him. He realized he was naked under the blankets the moment he got up and wondered if the captain had put him here. He blushed at the thought, but he must have seemed a wreck, a sopping wet one at that. A knock came to the door just as he was trying to figure out what he would wear.

“Master Tintin?” Nestor called.

“Come in, please.” Tintin made sure to cover himself as the butler made his way into the room, clean and dried clothes hanging on his arm.

“I have brought these for you. Captain Haddock is waiting in the dining room for you.” Nestor had barely changed, it seemed the caretaker of the house would never grow older and would always be there when he was needed. The clothes were handed off to the young man and he was left alone again to change. The clothes were quickly put on and Tintin felt a bit more like himself, putting a clumsy hand through his hair to try in vain to quell his quiff. A few minutes later he was making his way down the stairs, Snowy prancing at his heels. Marlinspike hadn't changed at all. It was still homey, even in its ancient and historic way.

In the dining room the captain sat, coffee steaming in his cup, a newspaper propped up in front of him, a normal morning. Only it wasn't quite a normal morning. Tintin was here. The wind had shifted; the old sea dog could smell it. Something old and welcome was in the house once more. Still he tried to push down his excitement. He didn't know why the boy was here after all. Why after all these years would he come back to this place? Questions had plagued the captain all night and no sleep had been thrown the bearded man's way.

The crutch and how heavily Tintin relied on it at the moment was the first thing Haddock took in as the well-rested Tintin made his way into the dining room. The second was the starved appearance he seemed to have. It had been difficult to tell the night before, in the dark and terror of his appearance, what the boy might have been through.

Tintin ate furiously, the captain allowing him, letting him eat his fill before he berated him with questions. As soon as the boy was done, his belly full to bursting and his little dog pleased as punch with a hearty bone to chew on, Haddock laid in hard.

“Rapscallion! Ginger devil! A billion blue blistering barnacles! What do you mean coming to my house in such a state! What do you think you were doing coming in this weather?” Tintin stared surprised at the captain. The captain had kept his appearance, albeit a little thicker around the middle from lack of adventure and a bit of salt and pepper graying to his hair. He was still strong and able; he was still the man Tintin had known a decade before. He then let out a laugh, a peel of laughter that spread through him, a laugh he hadn't had in a good long while. The captain grimaced dangerously.

“Come on now! This is no laughing matter!”

“Oh captain...my dear captain.” Tintin's eyes watered with happiness. “You haven't changed. Not at all. And you wonder why I came in this weather. Why didn't I wait till it was sunny?” the laughter died in his throat as he took on a more serious tone, the smile still shining in his eyes, blue as the deepest, clearest sea water. “I couldn't wait any more, captain.” Haddock's grimace lost its danger. “I couldn't wait; I’ve waited so long, too long. Pride and stubbornness wouldn't allow me to come back sooner.” Tintin felt his lip quiver slightly with the thought. He had wanted that very day to go back, to stay with the captain, to tell him it was all right; whatever they had was stronger than everyone and everything. Nothing else mattered. But it had, being a young man; it had scared him, his growing feelings for the captain. His fear of settling into a life he wasn't sure he was ready for, but now, now he knew what he wanted from life.

“You, captain.”

“Me?...Me, what?” Haddock growled.

“I went all over the world, through jungles and hurricanes, marshes and deserts. And I never found anything I wanted more than what is right here...right here under my nose, right here where I belonged and was loved. And I have no doubt lost it all; but I had to come, to tell you. It was always you, captain. I couldn't love any one more then you and all I wanted is here.” The cup Haddock had been holding slipped from his grasp at this confession; it certainly hadn't been what he expected. The cup splattered coffee onto the floor, but he didn't care.

“What...what did you just say?”

“You heard me. I will say it again and again if you like. But it won't change. I've screamed it at mountains and the world didn't end. I learned, captain. I learned so many things that I want to share with you. But I know I have lost you forever.”

“Oddsbodkins! Tintin, don't presume you know what's in my heart!” How could he say anything else? He wanted to embrace the boy, to make the man stay and never leave again. “I’ve loved you longer then you know and it's never left me, not ever. But...” he added. “I can't go off with you. I can't adventure...too set in my ways, retired.” it was the old argument again, popping up to ruin everything. But Haddock would not be dragged into revolutions and rescue missions, not again, his back gave a stabbing pain to remind him of that. 

“Neither can I, captain. No more mountains for me.” He tapped his leg which he had been limping on and pulled up the pant leg to show the bandage that in his hurry to warm the boy up, Haddock had not noticed.

“Took three surgeries to repair and I still can't walk right. I can do the country walks just fine, but anything too rigorous and I'm in bed for two weeks. No, no more adventures.” His adventuring had been cut short, and yet he did not mourn it as much as he thought he might. His heart had been mourning something far more precious for many a year now. Haddock stood from his seat and made his way to stand in front of the man's chair, taking in every inch of him. Tintin was sure he was going to argue some more but he was taken up into the strong arms of the captain and held, just held tightly against that barrel chest. Tintin's own arms wound around the larger man's torso and he buried his face in that blue sweater.

“There will be adventure enough, my dear boy, adventure enough for us both...” After all, life was an adventure, an adventure they would share from now on.


End file.
